Despite my previous move towards being chipper, there are still some distress signals out there. Marvel’s full court press on their next event, Original Sin, has been relentless. Maybe a little too relentless. After promising “unprecedented marketing support,” inclduing the eyeball giveaway, I notice they pushed the FOC forward a day, and released the first two issues to retailers, even knowing they would sure to be leaked to Bleeding Cool. I asked a retailer pal of mine about this and he said that pull lists for OS had been moderate at best—still my retailer pals tend to be the kind who aren’t just Big Two stores, so you can’t really go by this.

The idea sounds intriguing enough—who doesn’t like a murder mystery and eyeballs and stuff. But the “Wikileaks of the Marvel U” element has yet to be played out. I’m going to post all the promo material thus far and then MY own comments.

Sorry but walking away from a cloud is not shocking! I suspect Marvel will play up the Wikileaks shocking scandal more once the consumers enter the equation, but really the possibilities are endless. It’s a tabloid world after all.

Then read up on the concept of original sin and where it comes from. There’s no excuse for such willful ignorance in the age of free Google and free Wikipedia.

And I wish Marvel would bring Iron Man back to his red and gold color scheme. That black and gold look is and has always been terrible and is kind of dragging down the character’s Avengers appearances by making for a less interesting color palette. Reminds me of back in the 90s when Grant Morrison’s classic JLA got saddled with ridiculous electric blue Superman for like 15 issues.

“And I wish Marvel would bring Iron Man back to his red and gold color scheme.”

This has become more and more of a rule in genre entertainment and it was great to see it flipped in the new Captain America. Basically, the more serious and “legitimate” you think your show/movie/comic is, the less colorful and flashy the outfits. That’s how they got from the brightly colored jackets of Star Trek Next Gen to the overalls of DS9 and Enterprise.

So Marvel and DC will have similar yet parallel events this summer, just like 1984?

Hmmm… so who gets to pillage The Watcher’s abode? Or do his brethren automatically step in to deal with his porn collection and other stuff? And what of the Watchers of alternate realities? Is there a Watcher of the Watchers?

And I’ll wait for the “What if The Watcher Didn’t Die in Original Sin?” issue in a few years, narrated by The Critic.

[edited to remove link] BZZZZZZT this thread is not about speculation on story lines. It is about actual commentary and business analysis. You are more than welcome to contribute that, Rich, er, I mean Bleeding Cool. — EDs.